We are happy to announce the first keynote speakers to the conference: Professor Inger Birkeland (Norway) and Associate Professor Geci Karuri-Sebina (South Africa).
Inger Birkeland
PhD, Professor
Department of Culture, Religion and Social Studies, Faculty of Humanities,
University of South-Eastern Norway, Norway
Inger Birkeland is Professor of Human Geography at the University of South-Eastern Norway where she teaches nature-society relations, people-place relations, and education for sustainable development at the BA- and MA-programs in teacher education and culture studies.
Her research has since 2005 been focusing on strengthening the cultural sustainability of post-industrial communities Rjukan and Notodden, and supporting the empowerment of children, youth, and civil society. Recent book is “Multivocality in World Heritage: Rjukan-Notodden Industrial Heritage Site, Norway”, edited by I. Birkeland, S.F. Johannessen, G. Nordby and B. Richards, and published by Routledge, 2025
Professor Birkeland will give her keynote speech in the Futures Conference with a title: ”Imagining sustainable futures: Narratives of place in heritage-making”.
Geci Karuri-Sebina
PhD, Associate Professor: Digital Governance
Wits School of Governance
ICESCO Chair for the Study of Innovation and Futures in Africa
Director, Tayarisha Digital Governance Research Group
Coordinator, Civic Tech Innovation Network
South Africa
Geci Karuri-Sebina is a scholar-practitioner currently serving as an Associate Professor at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, and the ICESCO Chair on Innovation and Futures in Africa. She is affiliated with the Wits Southern Centre for Inequality Studies, Tayarisha Digital Governance Research Group, the MIND (Machine Intelligence & Neural Discovery) Institute, and the Civic Tech Innovation Network. Geci also serves as Organisational Architect with Dancing With Mountains; Adjunct Professor at the African Centre for Cities; a Principal at the School of International Futures; and a Director with the Southern African Node of the Millennium Project.
Her work spans the fields of anticipation, innovation and governance, grounded in her interest in the intersections between people, place, time and technological change. She also holds editorial roles in several leading journals in the fields of futures and innovation. Geci has Bachelors degrees in Computer Science and Sociology (Iowa); Masters degrees in Architecture and in Urban Planning (UCLA); and a PhD in planning and innovation studies (Wits University). She is a Desmond Tutu African Leadership Fellow.
Associate Professor Karuri-Sebina will give her keynote speech in the Futures Conference with a title: ”More than North Futures, More than South Possibilities”.
Sustainability, Temporalities and Futures 